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Proposed Music Festival Moving To Country Genre

OCEAN CITY – Although the presentation before the Mayor and Council was unexpectedly delayed this week, documentation shows the High Tide Music Festival’s genre has been transferred from rock and roll to country music.

Although Tom Russell of Founders Entertainment was not in attendance during this week’s meeting, a presentation was submitted with a couple of requests for the event.

According to Ocean City Private Events Coordinator Lisa Mitchell, the requests are to start the weekend event a day early on Friday, May 31, 2013, and to extend concert hours to 11 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and to extend Sunday hours to 10:30 p.m.

Ocean City staff has no concerns with adding Friday to the event’s time frame, as long as no additional set-up time is needed, and they referred to the Mayor and City Council for the consideration of extending the hours of operation.

The festival will feature two stages set up on the beach. The site capacity will be up to 35,000 a day with an estimated attendance of 20,000-25,000 per day. The proposed event hours are Friday, 3-11 p.m., Saturday, 1-11 p.m., and Sunday 1-10:30 p.m.

The event will also include art and craft vendors, sponsor activations, and food and beverage concessions to compliment the music. Founders Entertainment is working to sell beer and wine at the event.

When the music festival was first proposed in October of 2011, it was to be a rock and roll event, targeting talent such as Paul Simon, Tom Petty, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Mumford and Sons, Florence & The Machine, Adele and more.

This week’s presentation modified the targeted talent to be a country music event to include nationally-recognized country acts that typically play arenas and other large-scale venues.

According to Founders Entertainment, the current proposed layout of the festival spans from Dorchester Street to N. 1st Street, which is 32 percent smaller than the previously proposed event layout. The event’s perimeter fence will be approximately 70 feet off of the Boardwalk, per the city ordinance

The event’s load-in timeframe will begin on Monday, May 27, 2013. Due to the tight timeline, Founders Entertainment is looking to build many parts of the site overnight.

The company furthered that the benefits to Ocean City include an estimated $20 million economic impact, which is based on studies on similar festivals around the country. The event will fall on the weekend after Memorial Day and will drive hotel, motel, condo rentals and business to local commerce, organizers maintain.

I was looking forward to the festival with this original plan but don’t plan on attending a Country festival. Both of my college-aged will pass on this as well. I would be very surprised if it came at all close to the estimated attendance.